Heroic Ghost and Ghostly Hero
by Songbird of the End
Summary: A Zelda/Danny Phantom crossover. Jack's old colleague is the Professor in Ikana Canyon. The Fenton family meets our favorite green hero... and think he's a ghost. It gets better the longer you read. Promise.
1. Prologue

A lot of people are probably confused as hell or intrigued by the summary.

Just for the record, _it's true_. I have merged Zelda and Danny Phantom, though you won't see Link till the next chapter. Sorry.

Disclaimer: I do not own Danny Phantom _or_ the Legend of Zelda. Just read the dang thing.

* * *

"Rise and shine, Danny boy!" And that was followed by an intense light for Danny Fenton.

"Dad, why did you wake me up at 3 AM?" Danny asked after glancing at the digital clock by his bed.

"We're going to visit an old colleague of your father's," his Mom answered, "and he lives pretty far away. And your father doesn't want to hit traffic along the way, so we're leaving extra early."

"Wonderful." He mumbled.

"That's the spirit, my boy! Now, get ready to go, otherwise you won't be able to help with loading our anti-ghost weapons." Jack Fenton said in a sing-song voice before bounding out of Danny's room with his wife in tow.

"Sometimes," Danny mumbled through his pillow, "I wish I was born into an ordinary family."

Danny got up and pulled his suitcase out of his closet. He packed…err, stuffed his clothes into the aforementioned suitcase, and when he was done, stumbled out through the hall into the bathroom. He tried to not look at his reflection in the mirror (which consisted of messy black hair, bleary blues eyes and dark circles under his eyes) while he brushed his teeth and a slightly more awake Jazz entered the bathroom.

"Where are we going, again?" She yawned while reaching for her brush.

"Ao wo." Danny tried to say through a mouthful of blue toothpaste foam.

"What?" Jazz got her hairbrush and stared inquisitively at Danny.

"I said 'I don't know.'" He reiterated after spitting the cavity preventing slush into the sink.

"Well, wherever it is," she said while grabbing her toothbrush and toothpaste, "it must be pretty far away if we're getting up so early."

"Oh joy," Danny said sarcastically, "we get to spend who knows how long strapped into seats in a van that is crammed full of gadgets I'd rather not know about," here he paused to splash cold water on his face to wake himself up, "that could spell a very pointy and early ending for me and every ghost out there."

"Hey, look on the bright side." Jazz tried to comfort her brother who is currently glaring at his reflection through his matted hair.

"What's that again?" He asked as Jazz left the bathroom. He watched her retreating back for a while, then grabbed a towel from the rack and whipped his face dry. He grabbed his bathroom necessities (toothpaste, toothbrush, etc.) and stomped back to his room. He threw off his pajamas, pulled on his usual clothes, and stuffed everything he could into his suitcase. He paused a second, and looked under his bed.

"Some call it being paranoid," Danny said as he pulled out the Fenton Thermos from under his bed and smiled triumphantly, "but I call it being prepared." He continued to stuff the Thermos into his bag.

After wrestling with its zipper for the better half of ten minutes, Danny lugged his bag downstairs and to the front door. He glanced out the door, and, after not seeing his dad, quickly made his way to the back. He threw his bag into the trunk, glanced around again (not wanting to help load all of their "equipment"), and dashed into the van.

"Great minds think alike, huh?"

Danny spun around to see Jazz already sitting in the back.

"I guess so." He said good humouredly. Jazz scooted over and patted the spot beside her.

"What's the plan?" he whispered.

"Pretend to be asleep every time they look in," she answered, "and with any luck, we won't have to pretend."

"Sounds good," he said as he strapped himself in, "glad I thought of it."

"Silly." Jazz said as she rubbed his hair and buckled herself in.

It didn't take long for the two teens to fall back asleep.

* * *

"Aww, look Jack, isn't that sweet?"

"Yeah. It's great to know our kids are getting along."

"Shhh, not so loud. You'll wake them up!"

"Right. C'mon, Maddie, let's load up the van."

"Eh heh, right. How could I forget?"

* * *

Teral and Laret have been quiet lately...they're up to something.

Laret: Please read and--

Laret, how come you always say _read_ and review? If they got this far, they must've read it already, right?

Teral: Or have amazing self-control.

You stay out of this. Anyway, the first time I wrote this, I was so excited and it came out all crappy. I was so ashamed I deleted the document and had to start from scratch. The first chapter was originally longer than this, but I decided to let you guys have a sneak preview.

Laret: Please review!


	2. Castle & Meeting

Uh...not much to say, except I'll be uploading the next chapter hopefully pretty soon. I hope you all have as much fun reading it as I did writing it!

Laret: albinochocobo doesn not own Danny Phantom or the Zelda series.

* * *

"Wake up Danny." Someone nudged his shoulder.

"Five more minutes…"

"Danny, we're there! You won't believe this place!"

Silence.

"Ugh, fine." Stomp, stomp, stomp…stomp, stomp, stomp. SPLASH!

"Ah! Jazz, that's cold!" Danny shouted as he jumped off the seat after getting a bucket of ice cold water dumped on him.

"I had no choice," Jazz said looking smug while letting the now empty bucket swing from side to side, "you wouldn't get up."

"I'm up now," he grumbled, picking himself off the floor, "where are we, anyway?"

"Not sure actually." Jazz replied bluntly. "Mom and Dad ran off first chance saying they picked up a ghost on the radar. But anyway, you won't believe what the Professor says happened here."

"Who?"

"Dad's colleague!"

"Right, now what did he say?" Danny tried to stifle a yawn but failed miserably.

"Oh you're hopeless! If you really want to know, go ask him yourself. I'm supposed to be setting up camp." Jazz left the van in a huff.

Danny just stared after her a little bit, then got up and headed out of the van leaving a wet trail on the floor.

Whatever he was expecting the outside to look like, he certainly didn't expect this. Sure, the sky was still a light blue and there were clouds here and there, but the place was completely desolate. Far off to the right was the remains of a tree and some grass around it, but that was it. No other plants grew in the place. A giant stone gate was a little off to the right, and a weird music box shaped house stood a little to the left. Turning around, he could see more houses, but they were in disrepair. A river was the only thing that showed any life, and it cut across the dry land to over a cliff.

"I don't even want to know how Mom and Dad got the van up the cliff." Danny said to himself.

"Ah, you must be Daniel," a voice from behind Danny said, "Your parents told me a bit about you and Jasmine before running off."

He turned around and saw a man in a white lab coat with a blue and white striped shirt and green pants. He had a huge nose and fat, ugly red lips. His red hair looked like it was in a topknot and his ears were…pointed.

"Are…you the professor?" Danny asked hesitantly.

"Yes, but you needn't be scared," he said while chuckling, "there's really nothing imposing about me at all."

"What about your ears?" Danny asked before he could stop himself.

"That's just a trait of being of Hylian descent." The Professor shrugged the question off, then added, "Hylians aren't that different from humans, and here it's quite rare to see a human."

"Daddy?" a young voice said from behind his legs, "you promised we were going to move back to Clock Town."

"Pamela, we will as soon as Daddy's friends leave, okay?" he turned back to Danny and stepped aside so he could see the little girl behind him. "My apologies, this is my daughter, Pamela."

Pamela looked to be about ten years old. She had short brown hair and bangs, as well as dark blue eyes and a splash of freckles across her face. She wore a pink dress and green tights with red shoes. She ducked behind her dad again and peeked from behind the lab coat.

"She's just shy." He said while chuckling.

"Um, Professor?" Danny ventured. "Jazz was saying that you were saying something weird happened here. What happened?"

"Well, about four days ago, the moon got pulled from orbit and tried to ram right into Clock Town. You should have seen its face! Hideous indeed," he nodded to himself "I tried to enter the well up on that hill, and the next thing I knew I was in my house basement. That was two days ago." Pamela started fidgeting and looked around for something to stare at. "Yesterday, the moon seemed to be hovering directly above Clock Town when all the spectral identities vanished from the canyon, except for in the old castle, but it's impossible to enter it.

"And this is the craziest part! This morning, before you arrived, while the Moon was bearing down on the town, one of Termina's myths came to life. First, Pamela and I heard a flute play a strange tune, and then we heard it practically shouted back. Then, we almost got stepped on by one of the Giants!"

"Giants?"

"Yes! One of Termina's Guardian Spirits was residing in the Stone Tower! The four Guardians came out of their slumber, caught and held the moon in place above Clock Town! We all thought we were safe until they started struggling under its weight! Then, a green speck shot up into the Moon's mouth and, in a matter of minutes, the Moon burst into flames and disintegrated!"

"Really?" Danny said wide-eyed. "Cool!"

"Not cool," the Professor shook his head, "If the Guardians hadn't come, I doubt our valley would've been spared. Also, we don't even know who saved us. It seems kind of silly to give thanks to a green dot."

"That's why it's impossible." Jazz said as she came up behind Danny. "Pulling the Moon from orbit alone would take a gravitational force larger than the planet, and keeping locked on one small town on the entire Earth over the period of four days can not be achieved without sacrificing a large amount of time and effort and constant monitoring. Also, no matter how many natural resources a place has, it can't support the daily needs of a giant, never mind four! And giants!? There's no way they could exist!" **(1)**

"You said that about ghosts, too." Danny stuck his two cents in.

"You stay out of this Danny." Jazz seethed. "We are having a scientific discussion, and—"

"Alright, alright, I'll leave you to your science talk." He said in exasperation as he walked toward to river.

Danny waded through the river and approached the giant gate. He had to look up in order to see the top of the looming structure. He glanced from side to side and spotted a sign a little ways away. He walked over and squinted to make out the faded writing.

**_"Try what you will. This door shall never open."_ (2)**

Danny scowled and looked a little farther to the left and saw a crack in the wallface. He couldn't help but grin as he walked closer and peered through the opening.

"I smell a loophole." He said in a singsong tone, and he walked into the crevice. **(3)**

It was pitch-black in the passage, and Danny had to keep his hand on the wall to make sure he was going in the right direction. He didn't risk using a small ghost ray to illuminate it—who knows what could be attracted by the light. He saw a mesh screen up ahead, and ran forward to see through it.

"Well, I found the castle."

It was rundown, sure, but anyone could tell it belonged to nobility (or royalty, whichever). The courtyard had a dry waterway and tons of weeds, but the building with a dome-ceiling kinda gave it away.

A chill ran up Danny's spine and he saw his breath when he exhaled. Danny had associated this as his "ghost sense" which always went off if a ghost was nearby. He quickly scanned the area and soon saw his ghost. It disappeared after about five seconds, but it was long enough to get a good look at it.

It didn't look like any of the ones in Amity Park. It wasn't green, or have any glow. It just looked like a short person in a poncho like hoodie with bandages around its feet.

Danny's sense went off again, and he looked for another ghost. Then it went off again. And again. And again. And a good number more times.

"Jeez, how many ghosts are in there?" Danny asked between cold gasps. He looked around again, but saw the only way through was to phase though the wall. He stepped back and was about to go intangible when his Dad's voice stopped him.

"Danny!" Jack's voice sounded a little warped because of the tunnel. "Your mother and I caught a ghost! Come help Jazz put it in the Fenton Cage!"

"Poor guy." Danny muttered as he walked back to and through the river.

His parents had indeed caught something: Jack was holding a green sack that was squirming. After getting his pants soaked (again), he and Jazz went over to the RV and strained against the cage's weight.

"Jeez, Dad, did you make the thing out of lead?" Danny ground out after nearly dropping the cage on his foot.

"Lead sprayed with anti-intangible ghost gunk." He said cheerfully when he dropped the sack none too gently into the cage earning an "oof" from whatever was in there.

"Shouldn't you have let it out Dad?" Jazz asked concerned. "What if it suffocates?"

"It's sooooooo great you can talk about me as if I weren't even here." The bag quipped up sarcastically. It was ignored.

"Nonsense!" Jack shouted playfully as he threw down the top of the cage.

_Shik!_

A narrow blade stuck out from the sack and slowly went all the way around, effectively cutting the top off. The blade was steel with a checkered gold pattern that looked more like diamonds.

The bottom part of the bag fell down, revealing who was in it. It was a boy, about ten years old, with straw colored hair and bright blue eyes narrowed in anger that somehow didn't belong on his childish face. He was wearing a long green shirt with two belts: one belt going around his waist, the other went from his left shoulder to his right hip. By the looks of things, he wasn't wearing any pants, and too-big leather boots with a buckle were his choice of footwear. He also had long ears, and a floppy green hat completed his getup.

"'I'm so glad I can walk through Ikana Canyon and not get attacked!' That's bull." He said the first part sarcastically as he grabbed the knot from the sack and tossed it out between the bars.

"Dad! He's just a little boy!" Jazz cried, then she knelt down to his eye level and said in a fawning voice, "You wouldn't hurt anything, would you?" She tried to reach in to pinch his cheek, but he grabbed her wrist.

"Go to hell." He said bluntly.

* * *

A coupla notes before you go to the next one:

**(1)** The whole rant thing turned out really well, better than I expected. I should rant more often. And the scary thing is, I understand what Jazz is saying.

**(2)** I had this in a really cool font, but it looks like it won't get accepted into here. Phooey.

**(3)** My exact words when I first saw that hole in the wall. I felt like crying in frustration when I couldn't get in, though. Man that sucked—going through the Well was worse.

Teral: And she didn't know when to cut off the two chapters. This was gonna be one big chapter, but she decided against it.

Laret: Please review!


	3. Ice? Mikau?

Well, here's the next one. Only, what, 3 minutes between the two? I am good!

Disclaimer:: I own squat.

* * *

"Hey!" Jazz cried indignantly when she pulled her arm out, "Little boys shouldn't swear like that!"

"I think I'm entitled to a little bit of swearing, seeing as how I've just been kidnapped." He said in an even tone and added extra stress to the last word.

"I remember you," the Professor cut in, "you're the boy with the fairy. Tell me, where is your friend now?"

"Playing with her little brother." His tone didn't even show he was arguing earlier. "Dunno where, though."

"It's a shame," the Professor sighed, "I wanted to run a few tests on that fairy."

"Hey! Don't act like Tatl's just a guinea pig for your experiments!" He yelled angrily. "I hope no fairy has to be caught by you! Neeeee!" He finished with sticking his tongue out.

"Maddie, go get the scanner." Jack ordered. "We're gonna see exactly what you are."

"What do you mean, Dad?" Danny asked.

"Let me guess," the boy sighed, "My signature on your radar thingy shows I'm like a ghost but not exactly one, right?"

"How do you know that?" Jack asked suspiciously.

"Heard it all before."

"Riiiiiiight."

"Jack, we've got a problem." Maddie called.

"What is it?" he shouted back

"All of the equipment has been frozen over!"

"What!?" Everyone yelled as they ran to the back of the RV. Sure enough, the entire trunk had been completely frozen over with a thick layer of ice. While everyone stared at it wondering how it got there, Danny turned back to look at the boy. His eyes were shadowed by his bangs, but it was easy to see he was grinning maliciously.

"Well," Maddie sighed, "how about we get some food going?"

Everyone mumbled agreements, and Danny tried to stand nonchalantly by the boy.

"Okay, whaddaya want?" the boy said.

"How did you freeze the equipment?" Danny got straight to the point.

"Wouldn't you like to know?" He said with another evil grin.

"Um…" a shy voice interrupted. "Link, I'm sorry about this."

Link spun around at Pamela's voice and put on a happy grin in contrast to the dark smile from before. "Aw, dun worry about it. I had a lot worse when the Pirates caught me sneaking around their base."

"You were in the Pirates' Fortress!?" she gasped in surprise. "Why were you in such a dangerous place?"

"Because the Pirates stole something valuable to Lulu." He said in an odd tone, "I'll never forgive them."

"Lulu?"

"Oh, uh, Lulu is a Zora singer," he covered up quickly, "she's in the band The Indigo Gos. The Pirates stole her eggs, and she lost her voice. Mikau, the guitarist of the band and had a crush on Lulu, tried to fight the pirates to get her eggs back, but he got hurt really bad and I found him floating in the surf and pulled him to shore. The band was set to play at the Carnival of Time, but since Lulu lost her voice they might've had to cancel, and Mikau didn't want that so he tried to help her and he wasn't going to recover in time so he asked me to get her eggs back so I went into the Fortress to get her eggs back and got caught a buncha times and got thrown out as a result." His voice got faster and faster as he rambled.

Pamela blinked in incomprehension. "Oh…" she said as she tried to slow down his words in her mind so she could understand them.

When Pamela was out of earshot, Link let go of a breath he was holding.

"That was close…" his voice trailed off.

* * *

The first signs of a split personality is showing. Buckle your seat belts, you're in for one wild ride. 

Teral: We're gonna have fun soon, alright.

I wanna bring Igos in already! Can't we just skip?

Teral: No!

Awww...

Laret: Please take less than 5 minutes out of your time to review!


	4. Toast & Glowtures

**Edit:** There's something extra that I sneaked in at the bottom in the A/N. Please read it post-haste!

Teral: Come on, what makes you think it's such a good idea to cut it off right after Igos?

Laret: She's bound to lose interest sooner or later, and she's already struggling with the other multichapter fic.

Teral: Yeah, but there's no way to fit in that one scene in the shorter version. Let's let her live a little, huh?

…In case any of you are wondering, I'm having a fight with myself, and I don't know who's winning. The fight is concerning this fic, and if you feel totally in the dark about what they're talking about…good! You're not supposed to know! I own diddly squat.

* * *

"You can come inside for lunch, if you want." Professor asked. "Our house is small, though."

"Oh no, we wouldn't want to impose on you." Maddie politely declined.

While the Professor tried to at least get them to use his kitchen, Danny and Jazz walked back into the Fenton Family Ghost Assault Vehicle…I mean, the RV…and started rummaging around looking for stuff to make a sandwich.

"Any luck, Danny?" Jazz asked after a few minutes.

"Well," he said as he pulled his head through the cooler's top, "I found some of Dad's Fenton Toast."

"It'll have to do. I couldn't find any other bread, but I found the toaster." She said while taking the Jack shaped bread. "Did you see jam? This stuff's horrible dry."

"That's exactly what Tuck said." Danny grinned at the memory as he lifted the jam jar up to eye level.

"Wasn't that at the same time as Amorpho?" Jazz plugged the toaster into one of the outlets in the RV and popped the bread in.

"Yeah. I still can't believe Mom and Dad fell for their lie, though. I mean, ripping people's faces off?" Danny chuckled as he searched for a knife.

"Um," Pamela's small voice caught the siblings' attention, "can I have a piece?"

"Of toast? Well, if you really want it—"

"No, just bread." Pamela interrupted him while looking warily around the van.

"Okay." Danny replied after shrugging. He handed the piece to her.

"Thank you." She squeaked as she ducked out of the car in a hurry when the toast decided to pop up.

"Wonder what that was about?" Jazz asked rhetorically while Danny shrugged.

"Maybe her Dad likes to "experiment" in the kitchen, too." He suggested while covering his piece with jam. "If he does, I don't blame her."

Jazz shrugged and went to cover her toast in the sticky stuff as Danny walked out. After doing a quick search, he saw Pamela talking to Link and could easily hear their conversation.

"You're sure you're not hungry?" She was asking.

"Don't worry about me!" He said perhaps a little too loud. "I can go for a good while without having to eat!"

"…You're sure?" She sounded a bit dejected.

"Positive." His stomach apparently disagreed, since it made an audible protest. Link looked close to blushing as he slowly took the bread from Pamela while muttering, "Fine, you win."

"Link?" She asked hesitantly while he took a bite. Hearing his grunt, she continued. "Is it possible to…rip someone's face off?"

His eyes bulged out like those squishy stress reliever things and he came very close to choking on the bread.

"Where did that come from?" He replied after getting his coughing under control (quite a feat with no water available). Danny winced—she must have caught the last part of his and Jazz's conversation. It didn't really happen; it was just a cover story Sam and Tucker came up with when his powers went on the fritz and he couldn't change back to Danny Fenton. "Well, don't worry about it." He heard Link answer. "I've seen plenty of weird stuff, and Face-ripping monsters isn't one of them."

"Are you sure?"

"I've seen a side of Termina you couldn't, and shouldn't, even dream of. One of the few things I haven't seen—" a small explosion sounded inside the music box house which caused Link to pause and sigh before continuing "—is your Dad's cooking. You'd better stop him before he turns something…or someone purple." Pamela was running towards the house without before the sentence was even finished.

Link couldn't help chuckling as he watched the frantic girl run to stop her father from doing something quite drastic. He followed her with his eyes and stopped on that kid from earlier, who looked a little too absorbed in eating his toast. He didn't even try to stop the malevolent grin from spreading across his face as he decided to have a little fun and mess with some heads. Hero or not, he was still a teenager and allowed to be a little evil. _"Fierce, you're gonna love this."_

He chuckled again, but this time it had a deeper ring to it, and it did its job as the boy stiffened where he was leaning against the big vehicle. "Of course I've never seen a _**monster**_ rip its face off." Link stated just loud enough for it to carry, slightly surprised that it held a bit of Fierce's emotionless tone, and adding extra emphasis to 'monster.' "Monsters don't rip faces off; they rip you apart if you can't fight back. Me, on the other hand…I'm a different story altogether. I could take my face off as easy as one would take off a mask."

_"Smother him in double messages, why don'tcha!?"_

_"Dude, I seriously think you shouldn't've done that."_

_"Scaring others isn't nice!"_

_"…I've seen better…"_

_"Everyone's a critic."_ Link glumly thought butmade sure it didn't show. He could practically hear the cogs in the teen's head turning while he stared rigidly ahead. His toast, forgotten in the sudden pensive mood, dropped to the ground virtually unnoticed, along with the boy's hand—it changed from normal to mostly see-through.

"Not again." He said exasperatedly as he reached down to pull the toast off the ground. He made a face at the dust covered jelly and went inside the van to throw it out.

_"Maybe I shouldn't have dropped so many clues." _Link thought_. "If he figures it out, I'll be shipped off to the loony bin…or to that new therapy stuff people were talking about."_

_"I heard it's being lead by the Mayor's wife."_

"Oh, dear Goddesses have mercy." Link mumbled while gently rocking his head in his hands. After a moment, he sighed and glanced up. His eyes widened.

There, above the house. _Crows._ His hands slid behind his back and under his shield while he watched the birds with practiced ease. He pulled out his bow and nocked an arrow, and he frowned. _What the…?_

They didn't look like any crows he'd seen: they were green and glowy and looked more like vultures. And, why were they wearing red hats with skulls on them? Link shrugged to himself, and replaced the arrow for one of his more special ones. This one was pure gold and a perfect conduct for magic, and by far one of his favorite toys. He pulled back the bowstring and fought hard to keep from giggling at the feeling of magic pulsing through him to the enchanted arrow. He couldn't stop a giddy smile from forming on his face.

Link lifted his head to catch sight of the vultures and not a moment later he lifted the bow and fired with marksmanship that would put even snipers to shame. Light exploded from the arrow as it shot towards its target, leaving a very small trial of magic in its wake. The Glowtures, he decided to call them, actually took notice of the speeding projectile but by then it was too close to dodge. The arrow tore clean through one of its wings. It cried out in pain, and the others displayed more un-monster-like habits: the two that weren't hit grabbed the third and seemed to try to lower it to the ground—and out of sight. Link wanted to jump up, yank his sword from its sheath, run up to wherever they landed and finish off their miserable…

Link blinked as he abruptly stopped that train of thought. Since when did he do the whole gory thing willingly? He groaned as he found out where the unexpected feeling had come from and smacked his forehead.

"Alright," he muttered inaudibly, "which one of you is responsible of giving me bloodlust?"

Somewhere in his head, Fierce grinned.

* * *

I personally like that ending. As for Teral and Laret, they're still fighting--I mean having a heated debate about the subject. Please leave a review!

**Edit:** There is now a poll in my profiley page thingy majigger regarding the direction that this plot will go in. Teral and Laret couldn't settle the matter _peacefully_ (even with the sudden expansion of their council), so the matter is now up to you, the readers. The question isn't hard at all, fairly short, and hopefully confusing.

**Have a say in this fic's fate! Go vote!**


	5. Storms

The very, very late next chapter. I'd apologize, but it probably won't do any good. **Just please don't kill me, mmkay!?**

Does anyone else see a quality jump after the first part, or is it just me deluding myself? And how do you all like the new penname?

**Disclaimer:** The only thing I own is my twisted, twisted mind where this idea came from. Everything else belongs to their original owners.

* * *

Danny exited the RV empty handed. (This time, he decided to eat his lunch _inside,_ where there were less… distractions.) Jazz asked what happened to the first piece, but he was able to somewhat bluff his way through it. He didn't want her to have to worry—after all, this was a vacation. Sort of.

He absently glanced to the right to where the cage sat. Link was hunched over, seemingly absorbed in something and mumbling to himself. Curious and more than a little suspicious, Danny crept forward to better hear what the Hylian was saying. He could make out something about… mud and instincts? How do those two words go together?

Link abruptly stopped what he was doing and nearly cracked his neck from turning it so fast. And from the look on his face, he didn't look happy.

"What?" he snapped.

"Nothing," Danny replied quickly, "just… what are you doing?"

Link rolled his eyes, but lifted what he was leaned over. It looked like a lumpy, mud caked disk, except for where the mud was chipped off to expose the pink underneath it. "Cleaning one of my masks." His grin looked slightly more predatory as he mimed putting the mask on and off. "Oooh, look, I'm taking my face off."

"_Worst. Cover-up. Ever."_

"_Shhhhh."_

Danny just snorted and walked away.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_

Link admitted that he had made a mistake. He did not want to admit, however, that he panicked.

It was earlier that afternoon. The sun was making steady progress across the sky, nary a cloud in sight, and it looked like it was going to be an entirely peaceful day. The two older foreigners, whatever their names were, had excitedly exited Pamela's house and dashed over to their… RV, he heard them call it? Link didn't really care; he was too busy listening in on the couple's conversation with their children. It sounded like Pamela's father had told them about the fairy fountain and they wanted to check it out. Apparently, some of their equipment had defrosted.

And Link, whether he wanted to fess up or not, panicked. He wasn't entirely sure of what they were going to do or whether it was harmful, but the boy wasn't going to take any chances. But he couldn't refreeze the technology while they were holding it, and he could just tell that words weren't going to be able to stop them either. Getting desperate, he pulled out his Ocarina of Time and tapped out the first song that came to mind.

The Song of Storms.

The storm clouds materialized out of thin air as usual, but this time, instead of stopping after the first staff, Link continued playing the rest of the song. He kept his back to the strangers since he was always secretive of the few types of magic he could do, but they didn't sound too happy about the sudden downpour. Sneaking a glance over his shoulder, he saw the strange family run back into the Music Box House to escape the rain. Smiling triumphantly, he repeated the song a few times for good measure and put the instrument away.

A few peaceful minutes passed as he leaned back against the bars and listened to the sounds of the storm. Then someone decided to speak up.

"_That may not have been such a smart move, goro."_

The boy blinked confusedly, so the Goron decided to explain. _"Ikana Valley has been without rain for a long time, making the grass and trees die out. Without the roots to hold the ground in place, the entire cliff face might just collapse."_

"_And the river's going to overflow, too, adding more pressure to the already weak ground."_

"_And just _think_ of what's going to happen to the swamp!"_

"…_No one cares about the swamp, Twigster."_

"_**I**__ care!... Oh, and we're sinking."_

Sure enough, the ground beneath the cage had turned to mud and was slowly sucking it down. They probably weren't in any danger, but it just further illustrated their point. Link grinned sheepishly, classifying it as an 'oops' moment, and began wondering how he could fix it.

"_Make the grass grow. __**Heal**__ the land."_

Link obliged.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_

"Cocoa's ready!" Mrs. Fenton called cheerily as she entered the living room, balancing a tray with several steaming mugs of hot chocolate. Her two children were wrapped in blankets and were seated on the couch in front of the fire. The professor's little girl was looking out the window not far from Danny and Jazz. Her husband and friend were sitting on armchairs a little further away with their attention now on her. Maddie walked over to the kids first and lowered the tray. "Something to warm you up after being caught in the rain."

"I honestly don't know what happened," the smaller father muttered, shaking his head before accepting the mug. "Ikana's never had that much rain before, and for it to fall so suddenly…"

"Which means there are ghosts involved!" Jack concluded brilliantly while throwing himself to his feet. "Maddie, get the Fenton Bazooka. We're going hunting."

Danny and Jazz shared a quick look over their steaming mugs. The only ghost they knew that could control the weather was locked up somewhere in the Ghost Zone, and the chances of him escaping were slim. That, and the Fenton Bazooka wouldn't be able to do much damage against the aforementioned ghost.

"Jack dear, you know we didn't waterproof our weapons," his wife said patiently, trying to coax him back into his armchair. "They wouldn't last long enough in a battle, and it's probably still frozen solid in the van."

"You're right," he said dejectedly, sitting back down in the chair and sipping unhappily on his cocoa. His face suddenly brightened. "Man, this is great hot chocolate, Maddie!"

"Thanks, honey!"

The Fenton siblings just rolled their eyes, fully used to their father's antics. Jazz lifted her cup to take another sip but paused halfway. Her eyes narrowed as her hand moved to stop Danny from taking a gulp. "Do you hear that?"

Her brother just looked at her. "Hear what?"

Jasmine frowned, straining to listen to the faint sound. It got higher and lower, and it came at regular beats, almost like— "A song?" She turned her head to look out the darkening window over Pamela's head. The sun was probably close to setting. "I think it's coming from outside."

Pamela, upon hearing this, hastily set her untouched mug down and climbed onto the sill to reach the latch. This caught the adults' attention, and the Professor stood to get his daughter off the sill. She had already undone the latch, and she held onto it and jumped to the ground, opening the window in the process.

The song instantly became much easier to hear, despite the still pouring rain. The beat was slow and relaxed, and the tone moved from melancholy to shyly hopeful. The clear notes sounded like they came from a wind instrument, like a flute or a clarinet. There was a certain weight to it which made it sound mystical, magical, and mysterious.

"So beautiful," Jazz breathed, not wanting to talk over the soothing melody.

"That doesn't normally happen either," the single parent murmured thoughtfully, "but then again, it does sound oddly familiar."

"That's—" Pamela gasped, her small eyes widening in realization. When she noticed she had attracted everyone's attention, she blushed and looked away bashfully. "That's… pretty."

The Fenton siblings covertly glanced at each other. They could both tell that wasn't what she was originally going to say. Just what did she have to be so secretive about?


	6. Silent Night

As the clock downstairs struck midnight, Danny pulled himself out of his sleeping bag. After a warm dinner and several hours' worth of board games, everyone under the age of twenty had been shooed off to bed; the only consolation was they were so bored sleep sounded like a welcome distraction. The adults had stayed up until almost eleven before Professor Anton persuaded them to hit the sack, arguing that they would be able to better work after a good night's sleep (and that he had run out of coffee a few days ago and had yet to travel to Clock Town for more). The rain had only just slowed to a drizzle, and his father's loud snores from down the hall told Danny the time was now right for sneaking out.

The human version of Schrödinger's cat turned to look at Jazz's sleeping form through the nearly absolute darkness. The two had been forced to share a room because of a lack of space and would have had to share the bed if Danny hadn't opted to take the floor. (The Professor hadn't seen anything wrong with siblings sharing a bed. The siblings in question, however, were very close to gagging at the thought.) The half ghost had wanted to check out the castle all afternoon but couldn't find a good opportunity to slip away. When he mentioned his plan to Jazz, she made him promise to not stay out all night, to not take any unnecessary risks, and to not do anything that would somehow alert their parents. It was almost more trouble than it was worth, but at least now the redhead would know to run block for him if he was unable to keep the aforementioned promises.

He wasn't planning on getting into trouble, anyway; he just wanted to scope out the ghost infested castle. Knowing his luck, though…

"I'm Going Ghost," Danny whispered, deciding to not follow that train of thought any more than he had to.

At his prodding, the ambient warmth in the room faded into a deathly chill. He felt smooth fabric replace his pajamas as his heart stopped, and cool ectoplasm seeped through his veins while gravity loosened its hold on his body. His supernaturally green eyes flicked over to Jazz again, just to make sure the temperature drop hadn't woken her up. His older sister only turned over in her sleep and clutched a mended Bearbert to her chest. Danny Phantom grinned wryly and shook the snow white hair out of his face before shifting into the realm of intangibility. The next second, he flew through the wall and into the night air.

The rain had finally stopped falling, and the clouds were even starting to reveal the starry night sky behind them. Danny noted the night was darker than usual, but the glow from his eyes allowed the half ghost better night vision than regular humans. Turning his legs into an astral tail, he quickly flew around the abandoned buildings surrounding the Music Box House to get the lay of the land. He was almost hoping his ghost sense would go off, but his breath refused to fog in the air.

Eventually deciding to head to the castle and stop stalling, the heroic ghost swung around and headed to the giant sealed gate. When he neared the RV, however, the sound of music made him slow and move forward cautiously. The tune was obviously being played by the same instrument as earlier, but the song was different. The one currently playing was gentler and more calming than the first, and the teenager could tell there was some energy of some sort mixed in with the notes that made him feel drowsy. (It didn't feel exactly ghostly, though, so what was it?) Danny landed and peeked around the back of the Assault Vehicle and honestly wasn't too surprised to hear the sound coming from Link.

The young blond was sitting Indian style, his back ramrod straight, with a blue oval shape pressed to his lips. His eyes were closed, and he even slightly swayed to the rhythm as his fingers expertly flew across the side of the strange instrument. Shifting to invisibility, Danny floated closer to get a better look at the musical device—sure, he knew next to nothing about instruments, but he could at least get a good look so he could describe it to Jazz tomorrow.

But as he drifted closer, Link stopped playing and turned his head straight where Danny was. His face was hidden in shadow, but his flat tone alone caught the ghost off guard. "Stop hiding and come out where I can see you."

The dead teen froze, mind racing frantically as he tried to figure out where he slipped up and tipped Link off to his presence. He had been invisible the whole time; maybe it was just the drop in temperature that seemed to follow ghosts around? Danny thought maybe if he stayed still long enough, the blond would just think it was the wind or something and go back to playing his little blue whatever-it-was.

Then the child spoke again and dashed his hopes. "Look, I know you're there. At least show a little honor and show yourself before your opponent."

Despite being slightly alarmed at both how he knew he was there and not wanting to pick a fight, Danny switched into visibility. The soft glow he always gave off only slightly illuminated the young boy, but the Fenton could make out that he shifted. Frustrated at the lack of light, Danny lifted his hand and summoned a small amount of ectoplasm to work as a ghostly lantern. Link's face, now visible, looked surprised at the light (or was he just surprised at the ghost? It was hard to tell) before he leaned back against the bars and wore a relaxed smirk.

Danny absently noted the instrument was no longer in the boy's hands.

"Alright, I guess I'll start with the questions," Link said, still looking at ease as he listed his questions. "Who are you, what are you, and who sent you to kill me."

"What?" Danny asked, startled, quickly forgetting the first two questions. "Whoa, hold on a minute! I wasn't sent by anyone!"

Link raised an eyebrow and mumbled something under his breath before speaking up. "Okay, so you came of your own volition to kill me? That makes things simpler."

"I'm not going to kill you!" Danny shouted. "Why are you so focused on death anyway?"

The eyebrow was raised higher, and he sounded genuinely surprised. "You haven't heard of me?"

"No." Danny Fenton knew Link—Danny Phantom, however, doesn't. "Should I have?"

A slow smirk spread across the kid's face. "Who knows." He sat back up. "Well, now that we've established you're not going to kill me, could you do me a favor?"

Danny blinked, surprised at the sudden change in conversation. "Well, sure. I mean," he quickly amended, "it depends on what it is."

Link waved his statement away. "Don't worry, it's nothing too hard."

The half ghost watched, stunned, as the lithe Link slipped between the bars of the cage that (used to) hold him and climb on top of it. The blond turned to look at him and, noticing the look on his face, frowned. "What?"

Danny took a moment to compose himself and stop asking half questions. "If you could do that the whole time," he started, "then why didn't you just escape earlier?"

The Fenton wouldn't admit the grin now on the boy's face was slightly disturbing. "I was just bored and felt like humoring the crazy tourists. Anyway," Link brought the conversation back to the subject at hand, "all I need you to do is float me through the small crack on the wall way over there and over the fence on the other side."

Now it was Danny's turn to raise and eyebrow. "That's it?" he asked. "Why don't you just, I dunno, walk over there yourself?"

"Because," Link spoke slowly as if talking to a young child, "that would mean I'd leave footprints in the wet mud and give a clue to the crazies sleeping in the house with the giant horn on it as to where I went. And then they'll probably try to track me down."

While not exactly fond of his tone, Danny had to admit he had a point. "Oh," he nodded, visibly getting it. "You've really put a lot of thought into this, haven't you?"

"You'd be surprised what insomniacs think of at night. Now come on, we're wasting starlight."

Danny scooped the kid up bridal style, receiving an indignant "Hey!" for his trouble, and started flying slowly over to the sealed gate. The river, pitch black without any sort of light source, gurgled softly under him and reflected some of his glow. Once he reached the sealed gate and started to survey the wall around it, he decided to strike up another conversation to better cover his tracks—Danny still didn't quite know how bright the kid was, but he didn't want to take any chances.

"So, uh, why exactly were you in that cage?"

The blond in his arms snorted before replying. "The idiot tourists thought I was a ghost. I'm not entirely sure _why_ they'd put a ghost in a cage, but I guess that's the way the cookie crumbles."

Despite his ghost sense not going off near the boy, Danny wanted to be completely sure. He's already been blindsided enought times, thank you very much. "Are you? A ghost, I mean."

"Not a chance. Oh, and there's the tunnel."

Sure enough, the crack in the cliff face was in front of them, nearly indistinguishable in the very poor light. Danny turned into the narrow loophole and expertly dodged the streams of water falling from the ceiling, probably a result of the heavy downpour all evening. Once he was back in the somewhat lighter outside, he expertly angled straight up to avoid crashing into the wall in front of him and whipped over the top before coming to a rest on the ground.

"You sure?" he asked as he set Link down on the other side. "I mean, it's not like they can stick anyone they come across in a cage, so they must have some way to tell ghosts apart from everyone else. And if they thought you were a ghost, then…"

Danny was cut off by a quiet laugh, and when Link turned back to look at him, a dark grin was attached to his face. "I think I'd remember something as important as my own death. Thanks for getting me over here, though."

"No problem," the normally raven-haired boy answered. "Do you want me to stay so I can take you back over or…?"

"Nah, you can go ahead and leave if you want," the blond shook his head before another grin made its way onto his face. "If I walk out and leave footprints from here, they'll be scratching their heads for days trying to figure out how I did it. Granted, I won't be around to watch, but it's the thought that counts."

Danny chuckled despite the fact that it was his own parents that would be confused by the little stunt. Once he stopped, he decided to ask what had been bothering him for awhile. "Hey, just curious, but why is it so dark at night here?"

Link stared at him obviously shocked. "You really aren't from around here, are you?" he asked a little dazedly and with more than a touch of hysteria. Before Danny could ask about it, though, the ten year old shook his head and took a deep, calming breath.

"Because," he answered at length, "the moon isn't here anymore."

Danny barely even blinked before his head shot up, searching the heavens for the familiar satellite. At first glance he couldn't see it, but the aspiring astronaut reassured himself it was just hidden behind the castle wall. Quickly flying up, he soared over the wall and once again searched the sky.

The half ghost felt his stomach drop after a good minute of frantic looking. The moon _was_ gone.

Back down on the ground, a certain blond watched the spirit warily for a moment or two before stealing away into the decrepit castle.

* * *

Decided to put the Author's Note at the bottom of the chapter this time. Just to make things interesting.

I also have the best argument to defend Majora's Mask's title for scariest Zelda game. Anyone who wants to debate with me on it will probably loose.

Yes, I know on my profile I have 'Split listed under temporary hiatus, but it's for that very reason I wanted to work on it. Yes, I wanted to defy my own ruling. I'm just crazy like that.

Oh, and I've just thought of an ending for this. It'll take a bit of refining, but it will be friggin _awesome_ if I can pull it off. I'm going to make sure it works, and it will be the best ending I will ever write.

Yeah, there's absolutely no chance I'll give out free spoilers for it.

**Things from the chapter no one but me would've understood and are thus being explained:**

"Professor Anton;" I'm tired of him not having a name. I read on Zeldapedia that he wears the same shirt as Anton from Wind Waker, and thus, Professor Anton was born.

"The human version of Schrödinger's cat;" Schrödinger was a famous theoretical physicist who was one of Albert Einstein's pals. He proposed the cat thought experiment, wherein a cat is exposed to poison and eventually becomes alive and dead at the same time. I only felt like being overly geeky and decided to compare a half ghost to a half dead cat. Sue me.

"The Professor hadn't seen anything wrong with siblings sharing a bed;" I heard somewhere that siblings in the Middle Ages slept in the same room/bed as each other. Both Hyrule and Termina seem to be stuck in that general era, so I thought it made sense. Note that I did not mean it as an innuendo.

"Because the moon isn't here anymore;" Some people say that Majora's Mask created the moon that hung above Clock Town. I at first thought "It made the moon? Oh cool." and didn't think anymore on it. Well, one time when I was running around Termina at night and I was wondering why it was so dark. I remembered some basic astrology about how the moon reflects the sun's light onto Earth at night, so I looked up and started searching for the moon in Termina's sky. My thought process:

"I can't find the moon. There _is_ no moon—that's why it's so dark."

Looks over at the one hovering above Clock Town.

"I found the moon."

It was actually able to unsettle me for a moment. (Now there's only one thing left in the entire game that gives me the shivers. And it goes unnoticed by just about _everybody_.)


	7. Not Yet

I've decided to take a bit of creative license to screw around with the places in the story. In other words, they are now expanded beyond two-roomed houses and eight-roomed castles. Because it's completely unrealistic and it just bugs me.

By the way, how do you all like the new story name?

Oh, and krourou2, if you review again could you include your email address s p a c e d o u t l i k e t h i s? It's supposedly against the rules to reply to reviews in-chapter, and otherwise I can't contact you to respond to your review. And no, none of the things you listed is the thing that still disturbs me. (Honestly, I get a bit of a kick out of the mask transformation scenes. I usually skip 'em only for time's sake.)

And why does it feel like this took a sharp turn into Crackville during Link's part?

Oh, and disclaimer's in profile and will never be mentioned again. Whoopee.

* * *

Link watched the odd… thing shoot up into the sky long enough only to be sure it wasn't powering up an attack before turning and running towards the decrepit castle. Sure, the humanoid creature was pretty nice, but Link was sure it was just hiding its claws—whether they were metaphorical or literal he had yet to find out. To make matters worse, Fierce seemed almost confused by it and had refused any attempts the Hylian child had made at conversation. And when Fierce thought something was screwy, things were going to go very wrong very fast.

But he could dwell on human-like monsters another time. Right now, he had a mission to complete.

Expertly slipping a tattered mask on, Link hurried down the aged hallways, trying his best not to think of the low moans emanating from somewhere deeper in the castle. His worn boots minimized the sound of his footsteps on the rocky floor, using mostly memory to find his way around the rundown building. While the whole 'falling moon' thing was very unwelcome, at least it had supplied some light to Termina's nights and the inside of a haunted palace. But now, the inside was only a few shades lighter than pitch black. It was only when he ran across an intersection he didn't remember that Link decided he _did_ need a light after all.

Swearing softly, he pulled an arrow out of his quiver. Channeling a bit of magic into the arrowhead, he struck it against a nearby wall to set it aflame and make an impromptu torch. Shadows danced on the walls and further down the corridors, and Link forced himself to ignore his survival instincts that were screaming at him to put the light out, to meld into the shadows and stay hidden. The other occupants of his head squirmed.

"_Hey, uh, dude, do you think maybe you should, y'know, put out the light?"_

Link carefully withheld a sigh. _"No."_

"_Huh?"_

"_Whaddya mean no? Are ya crazy!?... Don't answer that."_

"_Listen,"_ the swordsman replied, _"I already can barely see my hand in front of my face. If something decided to attack me, I'd be completely vulnerable. At least now I'll be able to counterattack."_

It was more than that, though. Usually, he would have almost no qualms about walking in the dark, but now that Fierce was too busy to play radar, Link would rather take his chances with whatever the light attracted. As proof, the homicidal warrior hadn't taken part in the conversation and still seemed to be brooding over something. And besides, usually a small, flying companion would light the way for him…

Now that the others had more or less settled, Link shoved the thought into a dark corner and redirected all his attention to finding his way through the maze of hallways. He continued feeding the arrow magic to keep the fire going and kept a wary eye on the flickering shadows. The familiar groans steadily grew louder, but the physical child had faith in the mask he was wearing. Eventually, Link came across a round door he recognized. Pushing the hidden switch on the nearby wall, the door rolled open and he stepped in.

Immediately he was bombarded with the smell of rotting flesh and the groans were louder than ever. Only his familiarity with both allowed him to keep his cool, and Link stepped bravely to the center of the room. His gaze swept across the room and the wooden faces that were slowly turning towards him. He stopped once he felt all the empty, decayed eye sockets lock onto him and then slowly drift up towards his face.

All was tensely silent.

Then the zombies started dancing.

Most of the Redeads paired together and started to waltz while the few loners stood by the walls of the room and did their own, solo dance routine. Link patiently watched, oddly amused despite himself, for the undead dancers to finish their routine. After a few minutes, they took their bows, and the living Hylian clapped politely before stepping up to one.

"Hello," he said conversationally, voice slightly muffled from the Gibdo mask, "how are you doing this evening?"

All he got was a groan in response but he nodded anyway, acting as if he completely understood what the Redead was saying. In truth, he didn't have a clue. "I have come on urgent business to meet his Highness," the child continued in his most official-sounding voice, "but I seem to have lost my way. Could you point me in the direction of the throne room?"

The undead dancer moaned again and slowly, agonizingly, turned and pointed to one of the shadowed doorways. Link nodded his thanks and slipped past—taking extra care to make sure his still-burning arrow wouldn't torch the monster that had so kindly given him directions—before bolting down the corridor. Whenever the troupe started dancing, he was never sure whether he should laugh or scream or take advantage of their distraction and just kill them before they had a chance to kill him.

Once he had gotten a respectable distance away and slowed to a walking pace, someone doubled over in laughter.

"_Dude, I think you were talking to a chick!"_

Link audibly groaned and felt his ears turning pink. "Shut up."

* * *

Danny wasn't sure how much time passed or when, exactly, he had drifted back down to the ground. It was just so weird, so utterly bizarre—even for him!—that the moon was just… gone. Vanished into thin air. He'd been watching the night sky for years, and-and how could that even be possible?

Wait… Wasn't the Professor saying something about the moon earlier today?

Sitting on one of the half-demolished pillars in the barren courtyard, the half ghost focused on the memory of when he first arrived, right after his abrupt wakeup call a la bucket of cold water. (Come to think of it, he'd gotten pretty wet that day. First Jazz with the bucket, crossing the river, crossing the river _again_, and then that sudden downpour…) Sure, what the Hylian had been saying then sounded like pure science-fiction, if not straight up fantasy, but at the moment Danny had no other explanation. He also figured that he wouldn't be able to get a more specific description of the events from the good man, but who else could he ask?

Forcing himself to remember all the little details from the conversation that seemed to enjoy hiding from him, Danny stared hard into no place in particular. Oh yeah, hadn't Anton mentioned something green shooting up to the moon before it self-destructed? Yeah, that's very specific. Green. The aspiring astronaut made a strangled, frustrated sound and buried his head in his arms. How was he supposed to find someone based on such a vague description as that!?

_Link wears green._

Blinking at the randomness of that last thought, Danny barely had time to wonder where it came from when two and two suddenly made four. But that was impossible; despite all his weirdness, Link is still a ten-year-old kid who likes to cause a little mischief. Sure, the kid has a sword, but there's no way he could cause that much damage.

The teen slowly exhaled and blew his pale bangs out of his face. But there's also that odd conversation from earlier, and what's up with the kid's obsession with death? The half ghost got the feeling that he was missing something. Something big.

Mulling it over in his head for a few more minutes, Danny decided to just ask the Hylian himself about this crazy theory if only so that the mystery won't keep the living-yet-dead teen up all night. He glanced around the courtyard with his eerily glowing eyes, looking for the object of his musings, but he didn't see him. Frowning, he hopped off the pillar and into flight to turn all the way around. Still nothing. Well, since Link probably couldn't get back outside, that just leaves…

Eyes widening, Danny spun to face the entrance to the ancient castle. "He didn't…"

Floating over to the large doorway, Danny Phantom heaved a tired sigh. "Well," he stated, "I did want to check out the castle."

He flew in without a second thought, oblivious to the spying eyes.

* * *

A word of advice: do NOT, under any circumstance, look up and watch the Detective Conan live action movies. It scarred me. The last thing that was able to do that was the Legend of Zelda cartoon series from the 80's.

80'sAnimated!Link: Well, ex-CUUUUUUUUSE me, Princess!

(-shudders-) Find a happy place, find a happy place, find a happy place… MAH HAPPY PLACE IS BURNIN'! D=

Oh, and before I forget, I chose a name for the Deku. I'll just explain it now just in case I forget to tell you guys (and in case I forget I already gave him a name and go looking for one).

Horst (pronounced HAWRST); German for "wood" or "thicket"

Anyway, leave a review if you liked!


	8. Round 1

**There is now a poll on my profile. Would it be too much to ask that, after reviewing, you all go and vote on it? Thanks in advance!**

I am **extremely** excited for Spirit Tracks. Nevermind the fact that it's already out and I'll probably never get to play it—if a Zelda game's main theme rocks as hard as ST's does, it will undoubtedly cause many heads to implode from its sheer awesomeness. Much like that side chapter of the Majora's Mask manga: the character designs were superb, and I'm fairly sure I've heard the story somewhere before. An African myth, perhaps?

There are so many theories regarding the warrior traveler out there: the first Link, the original Fierce Deity, a god of another sort, the antithesis of Majora… But alas. Tis for another story and my musings have nothing to do with this one. Nothing at all. Promise.

Anyway, here's an extra long chapter for you all. A very late Happy Holidays, and a not-so-late Happy New Year.

* * *

Danny floated uncertainly down the dark hallways, keeping a wary eye out for ghosts and the missing child. He held a ball of ectoplasm in his hand that he kept at about face height to light the way, and the endless moans surrounding him kept his nerves on a hairspring trigger. His ghost sense puffed occasionally, but he had yet to run in to any specters.

Reaching yet another intersection, Danny landed on the ground and looked at his choices. His self-made flashlight only gave off enough light to see a few feet in any direction. The half ghost sighed, wondering if he would find Link before sunrise. Not only had he promised to be back before then, but the kid's disappearance would not go unnoticed. Deciding he had wasted enough time, Danny kicked off the ground and phased through a nearby wall.

He regretted it almost instantly. A sickeningly sweet smell he didn't recognize made his stomach do an Olympic gymnastics routine that made him sink to the ground. Danny held his mouth until his stomach settled down (and even then it still felt queasy) and only then noticed the groans permeating the ancient building were louder in here. Hesitant, he looked up, and the sight made his aforementioned stomach drop.

Danny didn't know what they were, but he knew he was probably going to see them again in his nightmares. They were human shaped, but any facial features they might have had were obscured in a wooden mask that covered their entire heads with holes that allowed the things to see and breathe. Their lips had rotten away and their eyes were only sockets, though, so the teen almost wished the mask didn't have those gaps. Even in the terrible light his ectoplasm ball was still giving off, he could tell their skin was brown and stretched tight enough to the point where you could count the bones in their hands and feet and pretty much everywhere else.

And they were dancing.

That was somehow more terrifying than it ought to have been.

Danny forced himself back to his feet, phased through another wall at random, and didn't stop flying until he had put a good a good five rooms between him and the one that held what could only be zombies. He was breathing hard despite not having to breathe from the utter terror that had made him flee and sank to the scratchy ground from relief. He waited until his breaths evened out before he looked around the room he had stopped in.

The floor was covered in dead weeds and grass, explaining why it felt scratchy, and when he summoned his flashlight again he could see several ornate pots, some of them still miraculously hanging from the ceiling. Columns went around the perimeter of the room, decorated with engravings that had been worn away by time. Looking up, Danny could tell this room had no ceiling, and he decided it had probably been a courtyard long ago.

Something crunched behind him, and the ghost teen whipped around and readied an ectoplasm blast, making his hand shine brighter than before and illuminating a bigger patch of dried weeds. When he saw what was sneaking up on him, Danny's jaw dropped for the second time that night.

It looked like a giant, severed hand whose skinny fingers made it resemble a giant spider. The tendons stood out in pale contrast against the dark purple skin, and the wrist, held up in the air, waved back and forth as if studying him, wondering if he was worth its time. It seemed to make a decision as it crouched low to the ground and pounced.

Danny threw himself out of the way as it landed on the spot where he had been previously, its wicked nails sinking threateningly into the dry earth. He threw his arm forward and let loose the blast, smiling triumphantly when it hit the… whatever it was on its thumb. The smile quickly faded, however, when it somehow screeched in pain and slowly picked itself off the ground. A second ectoblast knocked it back down with another agonized scream, but this time the mutant hand spontaneously burst into green flame.

The teen watched, baffled, as the hand was incinerated into nothing—nothing, except for three small shadows hidden in the fire's brilliance. Danny whipped up another ectoblast and stared, horrified, at the shadows, which turned out to be smaller versions of the logic-defying hand. They ran speedily and unpredictably around the courtyard, and the fact that most of said courtyard was shrouded in darkness did not help.

Danny shot several smaller ectoblasts from his fingers at the mini-hands, but they proved to be too quick for him. And as they started jumping at him to protect the one he was aiming at, Danny could only think of one thing to say.

"What the heck is wrong with this place!?"

-()-

After a few more minutes of wandering, snickers, and silent death threats including metal pokers and fire, Link came across a familiar intricate doorway that blocked the entrance of the throne room. Sighing in relief, he took off the bandaged mask and looked at his arrow-torch in thought. The Hylian still had a fair amount of magic left, but he might need it later, so he tossed the burning arrow into a nearby alcove. Without fueling the fire with magic, it would be finally able to consume the wooden shaft it had been denied all night.

A silent yawn fought its way out of Link's mouth. How long had it been since he'd had a decent night's sleep? The hero honestly couldn't remember. The world's impending doom had done a great job of keeping him awake through all the wee hours of the night, but that had only kept him from going to sleep, which he was actually grateful for. Everything else caught up to him whenever he put his head down to rest…

Shaking his head and audibly growling, Link jabbed an impatient finger into the hidden door switch. He almost missed Tatl's mindless prattling; it always did a wonderful job of distracting him from his thoughts. Hopping from one foot to another, the Hylian waited only until the opening was wide enough for him to squeeze through before dashing into the throne room and away from the only source of light and warmth in the entire castle. Eventually, the door rolled back into place and plunged the room into absolute darkness.

Link didn't feel like wasting time that night; he couldn't shake the feeling that something bad was going to happen. Taking a deep breath, he shouted into the darkness of the throne room, adding just enough magic for it to echo beyond the walls. "**Igos**!"

His voice reverberated throughout the empty room, and then a purple flame materialized in front of the high-backed chair. It was small at first, but it steadily grew larger until a familiar skull appeared in it. The red and gold headdress quivered as the head tilted down to look at the only truly living thing in its castle with eerie green eyes. Despite the fact that its skin was gone, Link got the impression of it smiling.

"Ah, Warrior. You have returned," Igos du Ikana said warmly, using the title he had bestowed upon Link when he had first stormed the castle, "and you have successfully destroyed the curse emanating from that foul tower. Many of my people have finally fallen into their eternal slumber."

"I am surprised to see that you still walk the earth, Igos," Link said deferentially. Sure, the guy was dead, but he was still a king. "I'd have thought you would have been the first to sleep."

"A king cannot abandon his people," the Ikanan stated. "Not all of my own have left this world, and I will not leave the ones who are still here behind. Once the last of my subjects have left, I will follow them into the arms of oblivion."

Link frowned. That wasn't good. "I'm afraid you might not have enough time to wait for them to go of their own will. There are strange people in the valley that claim to be ghost hunters, and I've overheard that they plan to explore your castle."

"Oh?" The king narrowed his eyes, characteristic Ikanan mistrust kicking in. "And what, exactly, are you trying to say?"

Reminding himself to be respectful, Link inclined his head. "I'm only saying that it may be safer in Stone Tower than your castle once the sun rises. With the curse gone, the only threat climbing it would be the boulders."

"_And you wouldn't have to worry about that, would ya, kingy? You'd just have to fly all the way to the top—"_

"_Shut __**up**__, Horst!"_

"—_not like how _we_ had to do it, with all the switches and switching and playing that cursed tune over and over and over till your bark starts peeling by itself—"_

"_That's it!"_

The annoying squeaky voice let out a terrified scream before it got prematurely cut off and shoved into a tiny, dark corner, and all Link heard was blessed silence. The undead king was seriously pondering the boy's proposition, looking at it from all angles. Eventually, he answered grudgingly.

"I can see the logic in your suggestion. Very well," Igos replied before raising his voice. "Knights! To me!"

Two more purple flames burned into existence, revealing themselves to be the skulls of the two stalfos Link had had to fight earlier. Judging by the irregularity of their aura, the two had probably been fighting again.

"You called for us, my liege?" The skinnier knight asked in a very familiar nasally squeak.

"I am charging you both with a task of utmost importance, one in which you must not bicker with each other and work together," the king paused to survey the two with a critical eye. "Can I trust you two to do this?"

"Of course, Your Highness," the chubby one said, bowing his head in reverence. "Just tell us what to do and it shall be done."

The undead royal stayed silent for a moment, choosing his words carefully. "Dangerous humans have come to the valley, calling themselves 'ghost hunters'. I have been told that they will storm this castle after the sun has risen."

"Then we will fight them off, Your Majesty!" The chubby skull spoke up vehemently. "They are just stinking mortals—"

"**DO NOT INTERRUPT ME!"** Igos thundered, causing both of his men to jump and shake with fear. Link silently applauded the floating head for somehow being very intimidating despite his… cutbacks, so to speak.

"Our numbers are not as large as they once were! Their weapons and skill is something we can no longer best and can still call a victory," the king continued once his voice had stopped ringing throughout the room. "Your job is to spread the evacuation order. We're falling back to Stone Tower."

"What!?" The chubby skull shouted while the skinny one objected. "But sire—"

"That is a direct order, Knights," the last descendant of the royal bloodline said firmly. "Are you going to disobey me?"

The knights stared slack jawed at their king before hastily bowing. They said, "Your will shall be done!" in unison and disappeared in a burst of purple fire. Link waited for a moment before speaking up. "Are you sure they'll be able to complete your mission before daybreak?"

Igos chuckled. "I have faith in them. They will complete it well before the deadline, so long as they do not start arguing. But squabbling now would go against my orders, and that is the one thing they will never dare to do. Hmm?"

Confused by his sudden change in tone, the living Hylian queried, "What is it?"

The king seemed to frown. "Two wandering spirits have started a fight inside one of the courtyards."

"One of your soldiers and a Garo spy?"

"No, neither of the spirits belong to our age old feud. They're much too young to have existed when Ikana was still a wealthy kingdom," the undead king hummed in thought before addressing the child swordsman again. "On your way out, could you keep an eye on the fighters? I don't want any of my subjects to get caught in the crossfire."

"Of course," Link nodded before turning to exit.

"Oh, and Warrior?" Igos said as an afterthought, making the Hylian pause and turn back to the floating head. "I believe there is a way for me to help you with your… undead guests. I understand they can be quite distracting."

Link stared at the floating skull for a moment, confused, before it dawned on him what the king was talking about. His eyes widened in shock. "How… how did you—?"

"Know? Perhaps you have forgotten that I am a previously cursed spirit myself, and that I can tell where every ghost, curse, and breathing thing is inside my castle?" He seemed amused by the Hylian's expression. "When you climb the tower to tell us the humans have gone, I will have an answer to your problem." And with that, the king took his leave, humming the Elegy of Emptiness as he went, and the room was plunged into darkness once more.

-()-

As the last of the mini-hands burned away into nothingness, Danny landed back on the ground and took a moment to rest. After several minutes of fruitless blasting, he had finally decided to change tactics and kept an eye on all three of the little monsters, only firing at one when it tried to grab hold of his neck. It was hard to watch all three at once, but it got easier every time he successfully took one out.

He fingered one of the numerous cuts in his suit, caused when one of the things leapt for his neck and he hadn't gotten completely out of the way in time. His back hurt a little from when he had run into a pillar on one of his first tries to dodge a flying hand, which had probably made that cut along his side.

Danny sighed, remembering he was going to try avoiding trouble tonight, and then he gasped—ghost sense. He drifted into the air and quickly scanned the courtyard, eyes having gotten used to the gloom sometime during his fight with the hands. He didn't see anyone. "Who's there?"

"Is that the way you greet an old friend?"

Danny's head whipped around to face the owner of that well-manicured voice, but a black gloved fist sucker punched him with enough force to send him flying into the ground and cause a cloud of dust to go airborne. The teen picked himself off the ground and gingerly touched his cheek before glaring at the ghost in white. "Vlad. I should've known you would've shown up sooner or later."

The vampire-esque half-ghost mused dramatically, "Am I really getting that predictable?"

"Still haven't bought that cat yet?" Danny shot back, standing and taking a cocky relaxed stance while his adversary glowered at him. "I'm not Jazz, but even I know it's not healthy to obsess around my mom to the point of following her here."

"Actually, I'm not here for your mother this time," Vlad smirked, moderately surprising the younger halfa, before magenta ectoplasm flared in his hands, "but winning her now would be just one less thing to do."

Plasmius fired the energy in the form of pink disks toward his enemy, but Danny was already flying towards him, zigzagging so none of them hit. The younger ghost pulled his fist back for a punch, intending to use his speed to make it stronger than usual, but the malevolent spirit simply moved out of the way. For added insult, he grabbed Phantom's wrist and used his own inertia to throw him into the wall. The teenager's eyes widened as he saw the stone getting closer before squinting his eyes shut.

Fortunately, Danny shifted into intangibility and fell through the wall instead, landing in a pseudo-familiar cold hallway. Unfortunately, Vlad appeared right after him with more ectoplasm pooling in his hands, and Danny was tearing down the hall before he even knew it.

Swerving at near top speed around corners, the teen's only thought was to try to lose his enemy inside the castle to buy him some time. There had to be _some_ way to get the upper hand against Vlad, who had chosen probably one of the worst times to be serious about taking him out. He hadn't planned on getting in any fights, which is why he'd left his Thermos in the room with Jazz. If he could just find his way back…

Pink ectoplasm whizzed past his head, and Danny didn't have to look to know Vlad was following him and smirking all the way. Whipping up some of his own ghostrays, he flipped onto his back and continued flying backwards. "Then why _are_ you here, Vlad?" Danny called back while firing at his adversary. "You didn't follow us all the way here just to take out little ole me, now did you?"

"Oh please, Daniel," the vampire-like ghost said smugly, easily creating a square shaped shield that rebounded the ectoblasts in random directions. "Do you honestly think I'm stupid enough to tell my worst enemy my plans before they've come to fruition?"

"Well…" Danny started before glancing forward and turning intangible right before he crashed into the wall. First things first: get out of the haunted castle, _then_ figure out what Vlad is up to. Another magenta blast flew over his head, and Danny amended his list of things to do and put 'Don't get your butt kicked' at the top in big, red letters.

The teen continued flying forward and phasing through walls, figuring he'd reach the outside sooner or later. He got quick glances of the rooms he flew through: one with a steaming checkerboard floor, one with most of the floor somehow missing, that room with the zombies (he wondered vaguely if this counted as a nightmare), and something that looked like a grand receiving hall. That last one was right before he burst out the main entryway into the cool night air. Relieved at finally leaving the creepy castle, Danny shot through the giant stone gate and made a beeline towards the house with the Fenton Thermos.

At least, that was the plan. The reality was that he smashed face first into the wall despite being intangible, and his first thought after the burst of pain was his thanks of a ghost's partial elasticity that saved him from any lasting damage. There was probably some physics about ectoplasm's molecular bonds behind it, but Danny didn't really care so long as it worked for him to not have to get plastic surgery behind his parents' back. Boy, he'd really have a hard time trying to explain the sudden need for a large boost in his allowance… and about _why_ he'd need it in the first place…

Gravity re-exerted itself and pulled Danny towards the ground just at the right moment to dodge Vlad's punch. Pulling himself back to the present, the teen shifted back into intangibility and phased through the ground, coming back up on the other side of the large gate. He felt a jerk as something closed around his ankle, and looking back, he saw his longtime enemy holding him back from running away. Then he collided with the gate (again) as Vlad swung him into the unforgiving surface, destroying his coherent train of thought like only a gas truck can.

When he gathered himself again, Vlad's discolored face and victorious red eyes engulfed his vision. "What, no witty banter?"

"I thought fruit bats didn't attack humans," he obliged, realizing belatedly that it made less sense out loud than it did in his head.

Vlad didn't appear to understand either. "I don't know what you meant," he said, narrowing his eyes, "but I'm going to take it as an insult."

The world exploded in pain. When it finally stopped, Danny suddenly found his heartbeat loud in his ears and felt the deathly chill of the probably-still-haunted valley. He groggily concluded he had turned back to human, and Vlad's words chased him into the blackness of unconsciousness.

"Goodnight, Daniel. And goodbye."

-()-

"Well now, that was a waste of time," Vlad said to himself as he floated over to the river, carrying the unconscious Fenton over his shoulder. He gave the teen an irritated glance. "This diversion had better not've put me too far behind, otherwise I will take the time to find his corpse just so I can blast it to smithereens."

Something hard smashed into the back of his head, making him drop his 'fellow' halfa into the mud. "Ow! What in the—?"

Rubbing his head, he turned around to see what had hit him and saw, to his surprise, a bare-chested older teen standing behind him with unusually large black eyes. He couldn't quite tell in the darkness of the night, but the skin looked like it was discolored. Weirder still, he was wearing a skirt.

"Dude, picking on kids?" He said with a heavy surfer dude tone in a strange, distorted voice. "Like, so not righteous."

"Of course it's not righteous!" Vlad shouted, irritated that someone with an IQ under 30 was hindering him further. "I'm a villain, I'm not supposed to be 'righteous'!"

"Oh, so you're a bad dude?" He questioned, making Vlad resist the urge to smack his face from the sheer stupidity. "Okay then. That makes things easier."

Before the ghost got a chance to question him, an abnormally wide foot planted itself in his gut and he was flying backwards.

After landing, Vlad gaped in shock at the young adult from his place on the ground. He hadn't expected to be attacked by the seemingly odd surfer dude; he hadn't expected the strength behind the attack which, he gauged, would've kept him down quite awhile if he had to breathe; he hadn't expected the attack would connect at all since regular objects usually just went right through ghosts; and he hadn't expected that his new opponent would take a fighting stance and dance lightly on the balls of his feet, waiting patiently for him to get back up and continue fighting.

Hovering back to an upright position, Vlad reassessed the stranger's threat level. He only now noticed the fine physique and deadly looking weapons attached to his gauntlets. "You made a big mistake tonight," he said, phasing to get the mud off his white outfit. "One you won't live to regret."

"Do you have any idea how many times I've heard that, man?" His opponent said cockily before pausing. "No wait… Most of them couldn't talk, so…"

Vlad fired off a ghostray while the teen was still thinking, but he avoided it with quick reflexes that surprised the vampire-like ghost yet again. "Whoa! Dude!" He shouted indignantly. "It's not fair to—waitaminute, you fight with pink?"

Quickly becoming irritated by the stupid surfer voice, Vlad fired several more ectoblasts. His strange opponent just danced around and laughed, seemingly dodging them by sheer luck while chanting "Evil dude fights with pi-ink! Evil dude fights with pi-ink!"

"SHUT UP!" The dead man shouted, and in that moment of inattention, the other jumped into a soaring uppercut. Vlad noticed before the attack was able to hit home and flew backwards, but he decided he underestimated his opponent yet again when he twisted midair to turn it into a roundhouse kick. It was only split second intangibility that saved Vlad from being forced back into the mud, who then quickly put distance between him and the eccentric fighter. Oddly enough, he found the unconscious Daniel lying in the mud beside him, reminding him of his earlier objective. He stole a glance at his opponent, to find him waiting, again, for him to stand back up.

"I don't have time for this," Vlad muttered, grabbing Danny roughly and chucking him with enough force to clear the side of the cliff.

The fighter watched the younger teen's arc through the air with wide eyes and seemed to conclude that he was going to fall over the cliff and into the river at the bottom, current fast enough to hold him under long enough to drown. "Little Brah!" He cried before jumping after Daniel and out of sight.

Vlad wasn't sure whether he should be irritated that the boy would probably survive now or relieved to be rid of the unexpected opponent. He compromised and just left.

* * *

…I know Mikau isn't supposed to be like this, but I'm having too much fun to care. XD

Yeah. I hope you guys don't get too mad at me about throwing Vlad in. I couldn't think of a good villain from Link's side (mostly because he actually **kills** his enemies so they **can't** come back), and I was drawing a blank from Danny's side other than the fruitloop himself.

I think Danny's a little out of character. Oh well.

Listen, guys, I need feedback on my fight scenes. This is pretty much my first time writing fights, so please, _please_ give me some criticism on them. (And a simple "it was good" is **not** going to help me here.) I wrote it while listening to Monster's Round Dance. I relived horrible memories just so I could make a decent fight scene for you peop—**WHY WON'T YOU DIE YOU GODFORSAKEN OVERGROWN WEED!? I CASTEDED BLIZZARA YOU SHOULD BE DEAD!!**

…That game centered around memories too, now that I think of it… (-shudders-)

Floormasters-I've never been so glad for Din's Fire in my life (except for maybe the Dark Link fight, where I just spam it until he dies). Those mini-hands are a _pain_ to kill without it, though I'm pretty sure they didn't split up like that in Majora's Mask. Oh well.

Igos rocks. Period. His part flowed fairly consistently and **OH DEAR GOD WHY DOES THE GOLEM HAVE LASERZ!?!?**

…Don't ask, you don't want to know. Here's something to distract—I mean, something for you to think about.

**Spoiler**: _Hey. Old man. Let's play a game._


End file.
